Isn’t it funny how something as simple as a pad of sticky notes can make a lesson more interesting? One minute it’s a struggle to get the kids interested in the topic at hand, and the next minute they’re alert and into the lesson. Why? Because they’ve spotted the sticky notes! Take a lesson […]
Today I just wanted to pass on some great little free resources for election season that I found on PBS Learning Media. They include videos and student activities about each of the presidents. The video series, called 60-Second Presidents, is a collection of videos that each highlight the events of the presidency and […]
What do 4th graders, 5th graders, 6th graders, and 7th graders all have in common? As soon as their teacher announces the day’s lesson, they love to respond “We’ve done that before!” or “That’s boring!” or even “That’s too elementary!” In Language Arts in particular, we have to admit that there is SOME […]
In those first few hectic days of a new school year what do you really want to find out about your kids? What will help you the most as you plan your lessons for the approaching days and weeks? In addition to the big stuff that you’ll find out from pretests and maybe […]
Task cards – language arts teachers love them, and so do students. You only have to copy them once and they’re ready to use over and over. And the best part is that there are so many different uses for task cards – from the variety of task card activities to the variety of […]
What is Classroom in the Middle? Classroom in the Middle is a blog and a store all about language arts resources for middle school and upper elementary. In the blog, you’ll find a big (and growing) collection of teaching ideas and activities, along with freebies that you can download at any time, for English teachers […]
Kids love a classroom that’s personalized with photos of themselves and name banners, but in the Language Arts classroom, you can take it a step further and really uses those beginning of the year days to help kids make your classroom their own personal reading and writing space. As kids complete personal writings, […]
To add to last-weeks post, here are a few more especially easy foldables that you can do without prep using only pain paper and sticky notes. Plain Paper Foldables These two foldables are super easy to make and require just one sheet of plain paper each. Four Corners Foldable – Start by […]
Foldables are great, but sometimes they can get to be a bit much what with different ones to print and copy for every new lesson. Sometimes it’s just nice to have a simple, no fuss plan for the day. But that doesn’t mean you have to give up on foldables. Just switch to some […]
You want all of your students engaged in the lesson – even when you don’t want a high-movement activity with lots of group interaction. So what do you do? For times like these, response cards may be just the ticket! There are many types of high response cards that can easily be incorporated […]
Sooner or later it happens. Your middle grade kids hit that age where they are no longer interested in the “prize box”. The girls decide that they’re watching their weight and no longer want candy. And sometimes you just need those little rewards to get your kids motivated in the right direction! What […]
Task cards don’t always need to be laminated and saved to use over and over for class activities. In fact, task have so many uses, and I keep finding more! Because of their small size, task cards are great to print for students to paste in their interactive notebooks as examples. You are […]
These task cards are all designed specifically for the middle grades – four through seven. There is more content per card than on the typical elementary school task cards, so kids still get to move around when you’re doing an activity, but they also will spend a few more minutes on each card […]
The more I read about task cards (and the more pins I save on my Task Cards Pinterest board), The more uses I find for them! Task cards can be used for whole class activities, small groups, and individual quiet work in a variety of ways. Here are some of them. Whole […]
Today, I’m writing about teaching with informational texts over at Student Savvy. The post is all about focusing on text structures and text features and also about ideas for doing some close reading. (And a FREEBIE!) See the post here. Thank you to Suzy at Student Savvy for the opportunity to blog there!
Kids may have to do research to meet their grade level standards, but sometimes they are not required to use the results to write a research paper. If they don’t need to write a paper, what can you have your students do to present the information from all of those note cards? Here […]
To generate interest in selecting new books, or to introduce kids to your classroom library in the beginning of the year, try having each student choose books for a partner. Explain to the kids that, in order to choose interesting books for their partner, they will need to know something about their partner’s interests […]
